The Crapbox...Comic books found in the quarter bin or half-off store or the bargain box. The good, the bad and the really ugly. Get ready for a surprise. Updates EVERY Friday and Monday until the Crapbox runs dry. (never happen)

Thursday, July 9, 2015

Kid’s Stuff, Part II: Sailor Moon #23

Sailor Scout-lesbian kisses form many friendship!

Someone is
probably going to come in here and cream me for all the Japanese stuff I’m
about to get wrong, but here goes anyway. Sailor Moon began as a cute manga series
about a magical girl whose destiny is to fight evil in outer space.
Author/Artist Naoko Takeuchi was asked by her editor to dress the character in sērā fuku, the type of sailor uniform
Japanese schoolgirls wear. After a brief series focusing on a single “Sailor
Scout” called Codename: Sailor V, the
book was expanded to include a sentai or
team of magical school girls when anime producers came knocking. Titled Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon, a second
series was released. The centergy created by mixing a team book with the
already popular magical girl genre turned out to be an immense success,
spawning one of Japan’s longest running animes with 200 episodes over five years
with five complete story arcs, 18 volumes of manga, over 5000 toy and
merchandising tie-ins, 33 CD singles and dozens of manga and anime imitators.

The Sailor
Moon story concerns ordinary teenage high school student Usagi Tsukino, called
Serena or Bunny in the American version, who finds that she has the power to
transform herself into a super hero after she meets a magical talking cat named
Luna. Soon evil bimbos from space are coming out of the woodwork to attack her
but she finds herself joined by several other “Sailor Scouts”, each named a
planet in the solar system and having various powers. Even better is the dreamy
young man Darien
who unbeknownst to Bunny is the even dreamier super hero Tuxedo Mask. *swoon*.
Gah, this book is just too girly-gay for me to like.

Call all your friends and tell them
how gay this series is!

I expected to
be bored by the Sailor Moon book, not aroused. Who knew this stuff should sit
on the Yuri rack? Because of my limited exposure to the Sailor Moon series, I
was completely unaware that two of the Sailor Scouts (Neptune and Uranus) are
actually lesbians. You heard me right, an anime about lesbian teenage girls
with magical powers who dress in micro skirts that are constantly being filmed
in low-angle shots that reveal their bloomers. Why isn’t every red-blooded
American male watching this show?

To start off
issue 23, we are continuing a fight from issue 22 with a chick who transforms
into a medusa-like creature. Here is our establishing shot. Note that word
balloons frequently explode off the page like the one in this panel. I’m not
really sure why every second sentence must be said AS DRAMATICALLY AS POSSIBLE!
Maybe it’s a Japanese thing?

Sailor Moon
bests the beastie with her “Moon Spiral Heart Attack” amazing upskirt-bloomer
power blast. She also kills about 2% of the elderly pedophiles reading this
magazine by virtue of autoerotic asphixation. I am luckily immune to both.

It’s only
after the monster chick is defeated that the four Sailor Scouts realize that
they are being watched from the shadows. Sailor Moon takes off in pursuit of
their peeper. The mysterious woman runs so fast that even under Sailor power,
Bunny can barely keep up with her. Suddenly she rounds a corner to find the
puzzling guest gone! Actually she ducked into a tree and takes this opportunity
to startle Sailor Bunny.

And it’s
about this time that the raunchy porn music starts playing in my head. The
butch haired blonde in the Sailor suit suddenly comes on to Bunny. Oddly
enough, Bunny doesn’t seem to mind all that much. Hmmm?

The fact that
Sailor Moon had “contact” with another Sailor Scout seems to worry her talking
cat Luna. In fact all the other Scouts' talking cats look rather worried too.
I’m thinking they are concerned about Bunny getting an STD.

Meanwhile,
the Scouts want to know all about this mystery girl. If Bunny could only clear her
head of thoughts of sexual experimentation, she might be able to answer their
questions.

But instead
all she can do is think about the mystery scout’s gentle caress hovering over
her. Her body quivering with anticipation, waiting for the moment that she will
feel those soft hands stroking her skin. Bunny’s lips parting slightly as the
hot breath of the other girl…wait, wait! WTF am I reading here? Isn’t this a G
rated cartoon for teenage girls? I must be just imagining all this lesbian
eroticism. At least that’s what I thought the first read through.

So the other
Sailor Scouts don’t learn much from Bunny about the nature of her “attacker”
and they head off to bed. Bunny is a bit…er, distracted by the newcomer and
can’t sleep. She starts looking through the newspaper and happens upon a
picture of race car driver Haruka Tenou. Is it just her imagination, or does
Haruka look just like the mystery Sailor Scout? I thought at first she was just
a little obsessed and in desperate need of some scissoring, but come to find
out, Haruka IS the Sailor Scout she just met. And he’s really a she. Everyone
meet Sailor Neptune, one of the two Sailor Scouts that we know for a fact is a
lesbian. (The rest could be as well because only Sailor Moon gets any kind of
time with a male.)

As you can
tell from the final three panels there, Sailor Bunny Muffin head falls fast
asleep while staring at Haruka’s picture. A sleep that begins with a dream
version of Haruka speaking to her in Sailor Neptune’s voice and using her
words.

Her dream
gets more confusing when Haruka starts kissing her, but it’s Sailor Neptune who
ends up finishing the kiss. To which the startled Bun-Bun can only ask “Who?”
As in “Who are you really? Let me take off your clothes and find out…” But
before she can act on any of those sentiments, Sailor Neptune runs away and the
dream turns dark, with some evil force talking about find three talismans from
the God of Destruction. A dream that all the Sailor Scouts share. Oh, yeah.
This is a book about super powered girls saving the Earth. In all the lesbian
excitement, I completely forgot it was just a subplot. And speaking of
subplots, get ready cause here them come in droves.

First up:
Bunny bumps into dreamy Darien,
who unknown to Bunny is really her long lost brother, Racer X…er, sorry I meant
her long lost lover Tuxedo Mask. Bun is completely embarrassed about her
feelings for women lately and can barely speak to him.

Which is
apparently ok, as Darien
carries on the conversation for her. Mostly by talking about Michiru Kaioh, a famous violinist who is coming in concert. Actually, unknown to both these
characters, Michiru is Sailor Uranus (stop laughing!), the lesbian lover of
Sailor Neptune. I’m not making this up! I like how when Darien asks if Bunny likes Michiru, Bunny
looks like she’s considering performing sexual acts with her instead of
answering. This kid is really sexually confused.

And the book
isn’t going to make things any easier for poor little Muffin-bun. Because after
school that very same day, she bumps into Haruka Tenou at the local video game
arcade. Seeing him raises really weird feelings in our heroine. It’s way easier
for her to deflect what’s going on here by blaming it on her dream. Which is
silly, because what are dreams but the realized wishes of the subconscious mind?
Even more evidence mounts on the next page where she notices that Haruka looks
like both a guy and a girl. As for Haruka, he/she plays all coy and gives Bunny
tickets to his/her girlfriend’s violin concert. Then calls her Muffin head and
disappears like the wind, the same way Sailor Neptune did in the beginning of
the book. Duh-Duh-Daaaaan!

The cats,
meanwhile, have decided to quit being cutesy sidekicks to sexually confused
teenagers and are redirecting their efforts toward a career in business real
estate. So it appears the cats are smarter than the rest of characters.

Also we learn
that at the exact same time as Michiru’s violin concert, pop star and evil
demoness Britney Spears will be singing at Infinity College.
Britney having taken on the guise of Mimi Hanyu to disguise herself and her
awful motives. Damn you, Britney! Wasn’t ruining the lives of Sean and Jayden
enough? Anyway, all the Sailor Scouts want to attend Michiru’s concert except
Mina (Sailor Venus). But the Mimi “Hell and Damnation” concert is only open to Infinity College students and Mina is depressed
that she won’t be able to get in. *sigh*

While all
this is going on, the mastermind behind all the plotting against the Sailor
Scouts is consulting her magic scrying pool and lamenting her past losses
against them. Down the side of the page is a listing of evil demon chicks and
THEIR LEVEL? What is that suppose to mean? Is this like Dungeons and Dragon’s
spellcasters? Or is it like Pokemon hit points? Either way it’s bizarrely
unrealistic and detracts from the ongoing lez-fest story the rest of the book
is trying to tell. The evil bimb tells her underling Mimi Spears that she is not
to underestimate the Sailor Scouts because Master Pharaoh 90 (90?!? Woah, he’s
not as high as some of the chicks pictured here) will not tolerate mistakes.

Back on
Earth, we focus on Serenity, or Rini, or Sailor Chibi-Moon, or Sailor Mini-me
or whatever her name is. She goes to visit her sick friend Hotaru, who just so
happens to be Sailor Saturn, although she’s not aware of it yet.

Sailor
“cutter” Saturn is the gothy member of the squad. She’s like this checklist of
all things goth: dark black hair, all black clothes, dainty romantic crap in
her room, heavy eye makeup, pallid complexion, sickly and I’m betting those
scars from the “accident” are all self inflicted. All we need is a few My Chemical Romance CDs and she’s set.
Anyway, mini-me and her share tea and then talk about their mystic amulets and
what Hotaru’s Father does for a living.

All the while
they are being watched by two mysterious female figures in sailor suits hiding
in the tree outside. Yes, it’s Sailors Neptune and Uranus and how creepy is
that? I’m not sure that lesbian super chicks should scope out other women’s private
conversations. It’s too much like Superman x-ray visioning through Lois’s
clothes. Inappropriate and demented are words I’d use to describe it. At least
when Rini leaves, they offer to take her home in their private helicopter.

That first
line from Sailor Neptune makes me think both these peeping tom-boys have been
hanging out in too many trees with views of Sailor Moon’s windows. And what’s
up with that wink from Sailor Uranus when she asks if Rini is “friends” with
Hotaru? Don’t they think that Mini-me is a bit too young for them to start
recruiting her for their team?

All the
scouts are awakened by the low flying helicopter and race to see who it is.
When they see Rini exiting the craft they pepper her with questions. She only
says that they offered to give her a ride back and that they said they knew
Bunny “really well.” If Serenity were my child, I would throttle her for being
so careless with her safety. I bet she’d accept a ride from John Wayne Gacy if
he promised her a balloon animal.

When Sailor Moon
sees them fly off, it’s displayed like she is longing to go with them. Please
go! Please! None of the stuff in the crapbox has a chance of getting as raunchy
as this is promising to turn out. Not even Issue 3 of Red Fox.

The next day
everyone is heading to Michiru’s violin concert. Everyone but Minako Aino
a/k/a Sailor V a/k/a Sailor Venus. She decides to sneak into the evil Britney
Spears show next door. But to do that she has to alter her appearance to look
like an older Infinity
College student instead
of a teenager. So what does she opt to change into?

Why a boy?
There is just too much lesbianism, gender bending and underage sexual overtones
in this book. Someone should notify Jerry Falwell. Or whoever has taken over
for him since his death.

Mimi “Spears”
Hanyu starts to hypnotize the audience into giving up their body, heart and
soul to Master Pharaoh 90, much like several Scientology sessions would have
you do. Minako realizes something is up and transforms into Sailor Venus using
her “Venus Planet Power Make Up”. I think every girl under the age of 17 uses
this stuff. It’s when they put it on about an inch thick in most places. Here
she is in the final panel giving us one last “almost caught an asscheek”
upskirt shot.

With that our
issue ends. Sailor Moon, the comic didn’t fair as well as it did in Japan; moving
from one company to another, it only lasted 35 issues. The anime show itself was
a modest success, but no where near the juggernaut that Mighty Morphin Power
Rangers or Pokemon became. I’m pretty sure that the lesbian overtones where not
even noticed by the American media. I wonder if they had been if it would have
helped the show and book's numbers? Guess we’ll never know…